"Political language -- and with variations this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists -- is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind."
-- George Orwell, Politics and the English Language

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Thursday, July 21, 2016

Broken Hearts Are For Assholes

Continuing with the all-Drumpf-all-the-time theme....

In the course of the last year, I've tried to balance the criticism of Drumpf with hopefully equal measures of criticism for his flock. If anything, they collectively are well due for a larger amount of contempt. As Rebecca Traister points out, a sui generis piece of shit like Drumpf doesn't just happen in a vacuum. Part of it, as always, is the ongoing addlement of large swathes of people who have marinated in "reality" teevee dipshittery for the past decade or so. They can no longer think straight, pure and simple.

But a more pernicious idea that must be confronted is the notion that Drumpf has taken over the party against its collective will. This is nonsense. Given its increasingly aggressive and fact-resistant rhetoric over the last couple decades, it was due for a toxic fuckhead to jump in and start driving the short bus. Someone with built-in name recognition just made the takeover that much easier.
But the stage had already been set, the crowd has been groomed faithfully for many an election cycle. So-called establishment Republicans trying haplessly to cling to their pathetic jobs will insist that Drumpf has hijacked their fair party, much like Rodney Dangerfield took over that nice country club in Caddyshack. They can't admit that they have been exploiting the baser instincts of their moron base for well over a generation, and now the fucktards actually want something in return for their abject loyalty. Enter Drumpf, the avatar of all their lowbrow aspirations.

The hacks who hope to keep their jobs, who pathetically veer between vague repudiation and eventual endorsement of this fucking lunatic, live in fear of the nasty base they've been stoking all these years, and now they're getting what they deserve. They can try to portray Drumpf as an aberration all they want, but he's an affirmation of their true values and beliefs. They believe Hillary Clinton is an evil cunt, and want her treated as such, violently if possible. They long for the days when a Bull Connor type could push around darker folks with impunity, when queers knew their place, et cetera, ad nauseam. Drumpf actualizes those hopeless hopes, those aimless aspirations. This is no accident.

When a toxic, corrosive candidate is as successful as Drumpf has been so far, factors must be considered. It is true that part of that success is due to name recognition, media savvy and complaisance, an overcrowded field of inept competitors. Ultimately though, the reality is that he is successful because there are enough people out there who are receptive to his schtick, who are as toxic and corrosive as he is. Or they're just plain stupid, and at this level, there is no qualitative difference.

At the very least, they are supporting a candidate who might as well be Putin Junior. We are heading into some interesting and perilous times.